"Snapshots 18: By Dawson E. Rambo Disclaimer: Fox Mulder, Dana Scully, and any other tangentially mentioned characters were created by Chris Carter, and remain the copyrighted property of him, TenThirteen Productions, and Fox Television, a unit of 20th Century Fox, Inc. All characters are used without permission, and no infringement is intended. Classification : MSR,X Rating : PG (Referrals to past sexuality, no dirty words, no violence) Archivists : Sure. Just make sure to keep my email address and this entire text as is without changes. Feedback : Please. Positive, negative, what have you. Address is drambo@sonic.net Summary : After returning to Washington, Scully and Mulder are pulled off the Starke case and assigned to an apparently unrelated case. Notes : This is a 'move-along-the-plot' chapter, and does have some interesting things in it. The MSR classification is up on the line because this chapter is part of a larger, totally MSR-based whole. I'm not sure how much MSR needs to be in a specific chapter for the chapter to be considered MSR, but I'm playing it safe. :) Additional Note : In Snapshot:17, I mentioned that the names Scully and Mulder would be assuming was "Steinberg." This has since been changed due to a reader's request. I am using my own middle name "Edward," as the basis for their new 'married' name. Geographical Note : There is no Court County in Montana, to the best of my knowledge, nor is there a town called Pave Creek. Readers that hail from Big Sky Country, I have created the entire town, it's population and customs out of whole cloth for the needs of this story. I have put Pave Creek in a place where there is no city, or if there is one there, it doesn't show up on my Rand McNally map. :) --------------------------------------------------------------------- "Well, actually," Grant said, "you won't be leaving for Pave Creek until tomorrow afternoon." "Legend," Mulder mumbled. "That's right, Mr. Mulder. The FBI is going to go to a great deal of trouble and expense to create two perfectly good fake identities for you and Agent Scully, and you need to be fully briefed on what we've come up with for the both of you." "Sir, if I may?" Dana asked. Grant nodded towards her. "What can you tell us about the witness we'll be dealing with?" "Well, not much, I'm afraid. What little we have comes to us via the Marshal's service. They're doing a favor with this witness for another agency, an agency that has declined to make itself known. WITSEC isn't always used for witnesses, you know." Mulder nodded. He knew. "So, tomorrow morning, bright and early, report to Quantico, Room 420-P. Until then, I guess we're done." Grant stood, and after a moment, Adams did as well. The four agents stared at each other for a few moments, and then the two OPR operatives turned and left Mulder and Scully alone in Skinner's office. A few moments after the door had shut, Skinner re-entered, his face grim. "I understand you two have a new...project," he growled. "Uh..." Mulder started. "I was under the impression that you knew about this, sir." "No, Agent Mulder, I had no idea that the OPR was going to usurp you and Agent Scully for their own ends. I don't suppose either of you would care to tell me exactly where you are going and what you will be doing for the next...however long it is?" The partners exchanged a silent glance. Without speaking a word, they both decided they could trust Skinner. He already knew so many of their secrets, what was one more? "We're going under as man and wife to protect a WITSEC client in Montana." Skinner didn't sit in his desk chair, he collapsed into it. "Well, that was just about the last thing I expected, I'll admit ." "That goes double for me," Mulder added. "Triple," Scully interjected. "Well, Grant told me that you two aren't due at Quantico until tomorrow morning. Seeing as you were up half the night on the plane, take the rest of the day off. Go home. Get some sleep. Get ready for this mission. Pay the bills, feed the fish, water the plants. Scully, Mulder, I assume the Bureau has copies of your apartment keys so that we can have Support Services send someone over to make sure the places are still standing while you're both gone?" "Yes, sir," they parroted in unison. "Good. Now get out of here. I don't want to hear that either of you have gone near the basement today." He thought for a moment, and then said, "Or the lab." The final comment had been directed more towards Scully, and she realized that Skinner knew about Danny. "Yes, sir," she said quietly, standing. "C'mon Mulder...let's go do laundry and pack for another road trip." Federal Bureau of Investigation Offices of Unit 620, Room 420P Marine Barracks, Quantico, Virginia 0900 Hours "The first thing we need is any and all FBI identification. I need your shields, your weapons, your ID cards, your parking cards, any FBI-issued credit cards or phone cards...anything that can tie you back to the government. That includes business cards... anything." Special Agent David Grant smiled at the two agents seated in front of his desk. "Dump it all right here." Mulder nodded and reached for his belt, unbuckling it and sliding it out far enough to remove his holster. Reaching into his jacket, he returned with his credentials, and put those on the desk as well. Reaching into the other side of his jacket, he found his cellphone, and that, too, joined the growing pile on Grant's desk as Scully mirrored his actions. "Any personal jewelry that can be traced to either of you?" Scully thought of the small gold cross that hung around her neck out of sight from Grant's prying eyes due to the high-necked blouse she wore. He'll never know, she thought. "That's everything," Mulder said. Dana nodded. "Me, too." "OK," Grant smiled, rubbing his hands together. "We'll put all of this into secure storage, and file a receipt with your SAC. And, until this project is over, you are no longer Special Agents Fox Mulder and Dana Scully. You are David and Karen Edwards." Grant opened a desk drawer and pulled out a fat manila envelope. He handed the envelope to Mulder, who opened it quickly and deftly. He pulled out two smaller envelopes, one marked "David" and the other "Karen." "Here," he said, handing the one marked "David" to Scully. "Mulder...we're not going that deeply undercover." Scully reached for her envelope and opened it. Inside was a Montana driver's license with her new name, but her real date of birth, all the vital statistics correctly entered, and a picture of her that looked very familiar. "Where did you get this picture?" she asked. "It's your Virginia driver's license, Scully. The DMV stores the pictures as computer-captured digital images. We just grabbed the image and dropped the right color background in with a computer. Magic." A social security card, a birth certificate, four credit cards, including a Gold American Express, a Court County library card, a BlockBuster video card, and her Montana Health Services authorization card to practice as a clinical psychologist with two specialties: Child psychology and sex counseling. "I'm a sex counselor?" she asked. "Well, the legend was built before we ever knew who was going to get it, Agent Scully. Try to play up the child psychology part if anyone asks about it. If you're uncomfortable with it." She could feel Mulder's eyes on her. "I'm not uncomfortable with it, I was just surprised." "Mulder, we'll go over yours first. You're David Edwards, recently published author of a book called 'From Beyond and Back.' It's a standard us-against-them scifi thriller. You can read it on the plane on the way out. You graduated from Yale in 1981 with a degree in Chemistry, and worked as a research chemist for Dow-Corning for six years before taking up writing full-time. Your wife supported you for the last few years until your big breakthrough. The publication of the book, and the advance on your next novel, has given you enough money to move to Montana, where you've always wanted to live. You have no living relatives aside from your wife, Karen. You have no siblings." "I'm an orphan and an only child. Convenient." "Yes, well, most of our undercovers are. It does tend to smooth certain issues over." "Hmm..." "Anyway, we kept as much the same as we could, down to your birthdates. You, David, were born in Eastchester, New York. Your mother was a homemaker, as was the style of the times, your father an accountant. No sisters or brothers, as I said. You were an above average student, with excellent grades. Your teachers remember you fondly." "That's great, considering I never met them. How do you work that, anyway? I mean, if someone tries to contact a teacher of mine, how's it going to look if they don't remember me?" "Oh," Grant smiled, "but they do. Most of the people we put down as contacts and the like are actually relatives of FBI employees. They know the name, David Grant, and know that if they are ever asked, they have a script to adhere to. We give them a little stipend every year, and they get to feel like they're making a contribution to the national cause. For the more involved cases, those people are briefed twice a year by us down here, and they get substantially more money." "I still don't understand how you can completely fabricate an entire identity out of thin air," Scully protested. "I mean, yes, you can get schoolteachers to lie for us..but what about the actual birth records? Hospital records? Immunization charts? Things like that? If someone really starts digging into these backgrounds, eventually they're going to find out that everything is not as it seems." Grant frowned and pushed himself back from the desk, steepling his fingers under his chin. "I could blow smoke up your ass, Scully, and tell you that we know what we're doing. But it's actually quite simple. Too simple, in fact. As you both well know, there is nothing illegal about adopting another identity. People change their names all the time. But creating the kind of background, the legend that we have built for your two is an intense, exhausting project, taking literally thousands of man hours and tens of thousands of dollars. "We start by finding death records and working backwards. We find someone that died as an infant in a different state then where they were born. From there, we reconstruct as much of the real data as we can. Then we insert records, fake records, into certain places, always with cooperation. Schools, churches, doctors' offices... everyone wants to help the FBI. I've actually gotten invitations to high school reunions from people that insist they remember going to high school with a person that died when she was six months old. The system works, Agent Scully. You have my word on that." Scully nodded, obviously satisfied with the answer. "Now what?" Mulder asked. "Karen Edwards, married, no living relatives, one sister that lives abroad. We keep the 'sister abroad' thing alive in case we have to pull you two out of there quickly. You'd be surprised how many of our sisters end up dying near the end of a case." Scully felt the blood rushing out of her head, and she gasped as the room started to swim. "You son of a bitch!" Mulder growled as he reached for her. "Oh, shit!" Grant said, realizing what he'd just done. "I'm sorry, Scully...I completely forgot about your sister!" Dana took a few deep breaths and steadied herself. "I'm OK," she insisted. "It just..." "Say no more," Grant said, holding up a hand. "I apologize. From the bottom-" "Can we just get this over with?" Mulder asked. "Of course. You went to college at Vassar, graduated as salutatorian," "How is possible?" Scully asked. "Well, two reasons. Firstly, there was a Karen Edwards that was salutatorian of her Vassar class, who did major in psychology, who did go on to get a masters degree and then a doctorate. She is also an FBI agent down in Miami. Secondly, Vassar didn't have the funds in 1983 to print a yearbook. And she looks something like you: Short, red hair..." "I see." "Anyway...the rest of your legends is being prepared as we speak. There's two things I need to tell you. The first is your contact. When you arrive in Billings, a Dan Stone will meet you there. He's a US Deputy Marshal, and he's been briefed in on most of what I've told you. Don't volunteer any information if you can at all help it. He'll be your contact from Justice while you're on this assignment. Secondly...your objective." Grant returned to his desk and grabbed a second folder. "Zack Tarses. The man...such as he is...that you are going to Pave Creek to see." "What do you mean, 'such as he is'?" Mulder queried. "Well, he's not much of a man. He's only 16." "A federally protected witness who's sixteen? That' strange!" "Odd," Dana agreed. "Like I said, he's not exactly a witness. USMS is protecting him for another agency. All we need you two to do is get close to him, and find out what the hell is going on down there. The poor kid is convinced that he's going to be abducted by aliens. He can't eat, he can't sleep, he walks around all day looking like something the cat dragged in." "How are we supposed to get close to him?" "His parents know that a child psychologist is moving in just down the street, and we made sure that his father picked up a copy of your new book last night," Grant said. "Complete with your picture on the flyleaf. When the kid shows up for an autograph, at his father's urging, you two will be on stage. Got the picture?" "I have one question," Mulder said. "What if the kid is telling the truth? What if he is in danger of being abducted by aliens?" Grant blinked twice, his mouth working. No sound escaped his lips. "We'll drive off that bridge when we come to it," he finally said. "OKlast details. The house is being finished now by a professional moving company. All the latest stuff, clothes, furniture, computers, books, TV, stereo, VCR, plates and spoons and knives and forks, everything. Clothing is your current sizes. You can take anything you want with you, just nothing with any information that might contradict your legends. No FBI T-shirts. No HRT coffee mugs. Nothing. Nada. Zip." "Zilch," Mulder finished. "Stone will have two cars for you. A Ford Expedition for you, Mulder, and a Miata for you, Scully. Red, to match your hair. If there's anything else you need, contact Stone. He has discretionary funding up to a few thousand dollars, and if it's more than that, he'll contact his people who will...well, you can figure out the rest." He rubbed his hands together. "Any questions?" "Only a few thousand," Scully observed dryly. "Anything I can answer?" Grant grinned. "Probably not," she admitted. "No weapons?" "Don't need 'em. This is a soft-contact mission." She nodded. "Well...two cellular phones. We will need those." "Done," Grant said. "Satellite TV," Mulder said. "Excuse me?" "Hey...March Madness? The NCAA? Final Four? Any of these words ring a bell?" Grant shifted in his chair. "I'll call the DEA and see if they have anything in their warehouses. Something sized from a drug dealer, maybe." "Hold the bullet holes." "Whatever." Grant stood. "If there's nothing else, you two have a flight in less than three hours. Mulder and Scully exchanged one of their trademark glances and shrugged. They stood, shook Grant's hand and departed his office. They were driving off the base when Scully smacked her forehead. "Shit! They did forget something!" "What?" "Rings. Wedding rings." "Good point, Scully." Twenty minutes later they were in a jewelry store, looking over rings. "My treat," Scully teased. "Your Visa card is just about melted." "Correction," he whispered, leaning closer. "Mulder's is. Edward's is fine." Scully grinned, and shifted her attention to a slightly more pricey set of rings. They were sized, and they paid quickly and left. Sitting in the car in the mall's parking lot, they looked at the paper bag on the dashboard. "Well?" Scully asked. "Should we do it?" Mulder was lost in thought. His mind was literally a thousand miles away, in Las Vegas. He had been there once or twice, and had seen the tacky wedding chapels lining the strip. He remembered their conversation in the office just before Pendrell had walked in, almost catching them in an embrace. He remembered talking about marriage to her, about how he thought about it. But he had never told her what, exactly, he thought about being married to Dana Scully. "We'd better," he said finally. "Gotta get used to them as much as possible before we get to Montana." Scully nodded. It made sense. But neither of them reached for the bag. Finally, groaning, Mulder reached for the bag and tore it open. Two simple gold rings fell out. Scully's had three small diamonds in it, his only one. Picking up the smaller ring, he held it in his left hand, rolling it between his fingers. He smiled, trying to keep it light. "What do you say? Marry me?" He reached over and took her left hand in his right, and then smoothly slid the ring over her finger. "I will," Scully whispered softly. Mulder looked up, an expression somewhere between surprise and excitement on his face. Without saying a word, Scully reached for the other ring and repeated the process on his hand. Mulder used his thumb to twirl the ring on his finger until the diamond was showing. "Can I ask you a question?" "Sure," Scully said. "Who answered? Dana or Karen?" Scully turned her head and looked of the window, lost in her own thoughts. Facing Mulder again, she reached across the seats with her left hand. Grabbing his neck, she brought his face close to hers. "Both of us," she whispered. They kissed. --------------------------------------------------------------------- END CHAPTER 18